Wang Daohan (right), chairman of the mainland-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, meets visiting Kuomintang Party Chairman Lien Chan in Shanghai yesterday. Wang congratulated Lien on the achievements of the KMT delegation during its mainland tour.

People on both sides of the Taiwan Strait are linked by blood and cultural background, Wang Daohan, president of the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, said yesterday.
Wang met visiting Kuomintang Party Chairman Lien Chan and his delegation in Shanghai yesterday.
He congratulated Lien on the delegation's achievements on its mainland tour.
"We have worked very hard over the past two decades to increase people-to-people contacts and improve political relations across the Taiwan Strait, in an effort to live up to the aspirations and expectations of Chinese compatriots on both sides," Wang said.
"In doing so, we have always harbored the good will of improving and pushing forward cross-strait relations."
Despite the political differences between the two sides across the strait, "we're all Chinese linked by the same blood and cultural background," Wang said.
"Therefore we should work together to promote peace, development and cooperation in cross-strait relations, strive for a win-win situation and contribute to the glorious future of the Chinese nation."
Wang said the basis of his two meetings with Koo Chen-fu, late chairman of the Taiwan-based Strait Exchange Foundation, in 1993 and 1998, was the "1992 Consensus," which embodies the one-China principle.
The KMT delegation arrived in Shanghai on Sunday on the last leg of its tour.